At first glance, you could almost mistake BBC America's powerful new dramatic series, "Copper," for a classic American Western. In a way, you wouldn't be wrong, despite the fact that the story of Irish immigrant cops is set in New York's teeming Five Points neighborhood in 1864.

The show is a milestone for BBCA because it is the first original scripted drama for a network known for importing the best of British TV, shows like "The Hour," "Doctor Who" and "Luther." "Copper" is not only made in the United States, but is made by veterans of American telly: co-creator (with Will Rokos) Tom Fontana and his producing partner, director Barry Levinson ("Homicide: Life on the Street," "Oz").

The series, premiering Sunday night, focuses on Irish-born cop Kevin Corcoran (Tom Weston-Jones), who sometimes seems to be only a few points on the moral compass away from the thugs, thieves, murderers and child molesters he pursues with ruthless zeal in Five Points.

The difference between Corky and the human vermin he chases is that Corky believes in right and wrong, despite how much that belief has been tested, first by the bloodshed of the Civil War, but mostly because he returned home to find his wife gone and his young daughter murdered.

Murder mystery

Haunted by the loss of his daughter, he takes pity on a young girl living on the streets and offers her a hard-boiled egg, which she devours. Later, the girl turns up dead, murdered with an object that has left a distinctive mark on her forehead in the shape of a wolf's head.

Corky's determination to solve the girl's murder puts him at odds with powerful, monied people, including a friend of his hard-drinking Army buddy, Robert Moorehouse (Kyle Schmid), whose life Corky helped save during the war. Corky, Robert and an African American doctor named Matthew Freeman (Ato Essandoh) all served together, and Corky has come to rely on Freeman as a kind of 19th century version of a forensic crime scene investigator.

With the first two episodes, we're given a telling sense of class and ethnic differences in mid-century New York. Some of the class divisions carry over from the old country, while others have been nurtured by postcolonial culture. The song "No Irish Need Apply" had been written just two years earlier, but as Irish immigrants found mutual support in certain urban neighborhoods - Five Points in New York, South Boston in Massachusetts - they dug their heels in and built their lives and families. They weren't given many opportunities, but being "coppers" was one way to earn a living, especially for men returning from the Civil War.

Attuned to history

And though the war was not yet over, the attitudes toward African Americans were already complicated. Matthew and his wife, Sara (Tessa Thompson), are free and living in the North, but that doesn't mean they are in any way treated as equals by white society. Sara is so terrified of living in the city, Matthew moves them to the still-rural country at the northern end of New York.

The class, race and wealth divisions in New York will only become more fractious as the war ends, thousands of men return home seeking work, and other men who were able to profit from the war use their money and power to buy up slums like Five Points for development.

We know the conflicts will continue well beyond the 19th century, but they were not specific to either New York or any large city in the 1860s: We see similar divisiveness in the nation's push westward between rich and poor, white and Indian, rough-hewn frontiersmen and emigrating Easterners seeking better lives.

That's why "Copper" evokes that most American of story forms, the classic Western. If Irish American director John Ford were alive today, he might find much to admire in the new series, as the haves battle the have-nots and raw justice is the only variety that can be effective in an urban "frontier" like Five Points.

Can it be coincidence that in Ford's 1956 masterpiece, "The Searchers," John Wayne's Ethan Edwards is driven by circumstances similar to those driving Corky? In that film, Ethan returns from pursuing cattle rustlers with a group of Texas Rangers to find his brother dead and his two nieces abducted by a Comanche war party. Ethan sets out on a long, harrowing journey to exact justice and to find his abducted nieces - it is both an actual journey through the wilderness and a personal one for Edwards.

"Copper" works not only because it mines elements of classic storytelling but also because of elaborately colorful dialogue by Fontana, Rokos and their fellow writers, compelling performances by every member of the cast, richly detailed art direction and well-paced overall direction.

'Multifaceted' look

Corky may often "talk" with his fists, occasionally augmented by brass knuckles, but Weston-Jones gives us an instant and multifaceted understanding of the mix of anger and loss, and the crusade for vengeance that drives Corky.

The writers have taken care to make sure the supporting characters are never one-dimensional and that their work is rewarded by effective performances by Essandoh, Schmid, Anastasia Griffith as a wealthy woman betrayed by her husband and Franka Potente as Eva, the "Miss Kitty" of the piece - a keeper of a brothel and saloon to whom Corky turns for comfort when he misses his wife.

Perhaps the most astonishing performance, though, is that of Kiara Clasco as the young street urchin Annie Reilly, still a child, yet forced to develop adult survival skills, some of which are ruthless. Clasco not only plays both Annie and her sister, but she is also completely convincing when Annie is pulling a complicated ruse, while never letting us forget that there is still a small thread of childhood innocence inside that cries out for protection.

"Copper" has much to recommend it: action, passion and great performances arising from an exploration of classic American themes. It could turn out to be TV gold for BBC America.